Van Breda Kolff

Bill (Butch) van Breda Kolff agreed Thursday to become head basketball coach at Hofstra, bringing full circle a coaching odyssey that included three NBA jobs and a high school coaching stint in Mississippi. Van Breda Kolff, 64, was also head coach at Hofstra from 1955 to 1962, compiling a 136-43 record. He replaces the retired Dick Berg.

Former NBA and ABA player Dennis Hamilton died Monday night in Chandler, Ariz. He was 68. Hamilton played for the Los Angeles Lakers in 1967-68 and with the Atlanta Hawks in 1968-69. He played a season for the ABA's Pittsburgh Pipers and another for the Kentucky Colonels in 1970-71. Though Hamilton wasn't with the Lakers long, he proved himself to be quite dependable during his one season in Los Angeles. In his 44 games with the team, the 6-foot-8 forward made all 13 of the free throws he tried (he appeared in two playoff games but did not shoot any free throws)

After the Waves' loss to Oklahoma State on Sunday, Coach Jan van Breda Kolff talked about building a program at Pepperdine "like they have done at Oklahoma State and other schools in this tournament." A glance at Pepperdine's history suggests the notion is not far-fetched. Jim Harrick led the Waves to five West Coast Conference championships in six seasons during the 1980s and Tom Asbury won three titles in a row in the early '90s.

Despite appearances, the Lakers' predicament isn't the same one their famous forebears with Wilt Chamberlain, Jerry West and Elgin Baylor faced against another dark-horse Celtics team in 1969. It's worse. In 1969, everyone thought the Lakers were in control, right up to Game 7 in the Forum with Jack Kent Cooke's balloons penned up, waiting to waft down in the victory celebration. If those Lakers were a bust as far as living up to their hype as the greatest team ever assembled, they nonetheless led the series, 2-0, a deficit no team had come back from in the Finals.

Former St. Bonaventure coach Jan van Breda Kolff is seeking the approximately $1 million left on his contract, saying he was wrongfully dismissed by the school. Van Breda Kolff, now an assistant with the New Orleans Hornets, had four years left on his contract when he was fired by the university last April as a result of a player eligibility scandal. * The No. 18 Georgia women's team dismissed leading scorer Kara Braxton Friday for repeatedly violating unspecified team rules.

St. Bonaventure fired men's basketball coach Jan van Breda Kolff and accepted the resignation of athletic director Gothard Lane on Thursday, six weeks after the team boycotted games because of an ineligible player. The school also accepted the resignation of assistant coach Kort Wickenheiser, whose father was the school's president. The moves followed the release of an investigative report that described the men's program as being in "turmoil."

Pepperdine basketball fans without a sense of history probably assume Coach Jan van Breda Kolff, 47, played the game. For one thing, he's 6 feet 7. But few realize an action photograph of van Breda Kolff is only a point-and-click away. Van Breda Kolff is pictured on the home page of RemembertheABA.com, a Web site dedicated to preserving the legacy of the long-defunct American Basketball Assn.

Butch van Breda Kolff has seen as much basketball as any man can in a lifetime. Yet, it's his eyes that let you see how much he has enjoyed it. Sit behind the Hofstra bench and the eyes teaching players, pleading with officials and surveying yet another afternoon on a basketball court are the same you see in pictures throughout van Breda Kolff's 40-year coaching career. His eyes don't lie as they brighten when he talks of coaching year No.

As his team's lead slowly boiled down from eight to four to two points late in the second half Sunday at the Towson Center, the toothy, gray-headed, pigeon-toed Hofstra University basketball coach was a grimacing, gum-chewing, ref-baiting dervish. His face grew redder, his voice taut. Bucknell students shouted at him in a manner you would not wish on your ex-wife's divorce lawyer. He endured that not because he needed the victory or the thrill, or because he had a point to prove.

After all those games coached, more than 1,200, at Princeton (he had Bill Bradley), the Lakers (he had West, Baylor and Wilt), the New Orleans Jazz (he had Pistol Pete), to say nothing of Picayune (Miss.) Memorial High School at the age of 60 after he was so long gone that he had been forgotten if not presumed dead by some, he's still at it, on the bench, off the bench, on his knees, falling prone to the floor. "Whaddya mean the foul's on us?" At 65, he should know better.

Things have been far from fine at the 'Dine lately, and Loyola Marymount's bittersweet run to the Elite Eight in 1990 feels like all of the nearly 18 years ago that it was. These days, the once-prominent programs at Pepperdine and Loyola are the dregs of the West Coast Conference, tied for last with Portland and San Francisco.

Former Laker coach Butch Van Breda Kolff, who had a sometimes controversial but always colorful career on the sidelines with 13 teams in three professional leagues and at various colleges over a span of nearly four decades, has died. He was 84. Van Breda Kolff died Wednesday at a nursing home in Spokane, Wash., after a long illness, his daughter, Kristina, told the Associated Press.

MY son, a former college quarterback, recently told me he has a recurrent dream in which he furiously screams at his coach. For us athletes, the connections between one's old man and one's coach are so transparent that I was about to come straight out and ask him if he was mad at me. Instead I simply confided that I have those coach dreams too.

Former St. Bonaventure coach Jan van Breda Kolff is seeking the approximately $1 million left on his contract, saying he was wrongfully dismissed by the school. Van Breda Kolff, now an assistant with the New Orleans Hornets, had four years left on his contract when he was fired by the university last April as a result of a player eligibility scandal. * The No. 18 Georgia women's team dismissed leading scorer Kara Braxton Friday for repeatedly violating unspecified team rules.

NASCAR is considering a radical change to its point system that would create a 10-race championship chase between the top 10 drivers in the standings. The plan would lock in the top 10 drivers after the 26th race of the 2004 season. They would then compete over the final 10 races -- with their standings possibly being reset to zero -- for the Nextel Cup championship.

St. Bonaventure fired men's basketball coach Jan van Breda Kolff and accepted the resignation of athletic director Gothard Lane on Thursday, six weeks after the team boycotted games because of an ineligible player. The school also accepted the resignation of assistant coach Kort Wickenheiser, whose father was the school's president. The moves followed the release of an investigative report that described the men's program as being in "turmoil."

Former Laker coach Butch Van Breda Kolff, who had a sometimes controversial but always colorful career on the sidelines with 13 teams in three professional leagues and at various colleges over a span of nearly four decades, has died. He was 84. Van Breda Kolff died Wednesday at a nursing home in Spokane, Wash., after a long illness, his daughter, Kristina, told the Associated Press.

Concealed in the long shadows of UCLA and USC, Pepperdine is proving the perfect workshop for Jan van Breda Kolff. No glad-handing alumni pull him away from Xs and O's to play 18 holes. No antsy administrators expect his team to pack 14,000 seats in a decaying arena. No reporters drive him into seclusion by chronicling and questioning his every move. Van Breda Kolff, 48, endured all that for six years at Vanderbilt.

The repercussions of the St. Bonaventure basketball scandal widened Sunday when university President Robert Wickenheiser resigned under pressure from the school's board of trustees and Coach Jan van Breda Kolff and Athletic Director Gothard Lane were put on administrative leave, along with Wickenheiser's son, assistant coach Kort Wickenheiser.

Pepperdine men's basketball Coach Jan van Breda Kolff capped a weekend of torturous indecision by accepting the position at St. Bonaventure on Sunday night, ending his tenure with the Waves at two seasons. Coaches play musical chairs at schools all over the country this time of year, seeking greater exposure and more money. Van Breda Kolff, 49, is changing jobs for a refreshing reason: family.